The only female Prime Minister of the UK, the Right Honourable Baroness Margaret Thatcher looks to be getting the silver screen treatment. Her story will be told in a short span of time during one of the UK’s most predominate military conflicts in recent history.
Hot on the heels of The Queen, Pathé Pictures and BBC Films have teamed up for a film about former British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher. Like The Queen, which was co-produced by Pathé, this picture will not be a biopic and will instead deal with only a few weeks. Specifically, it will focus on the 17 days leading up to the Falklands War (Malvinas War, for the Argentines) of 1982. Aside from the production company, there isn’t much else connecting this and The Queen, but that certainly won’t stop its marketing. Currently the only people attached to the project are screenwriter Brian Fillis and producer Damian Jones, so it is of course still possible for others involved with The Queen to become involved here — would Helen Mirren make a good Thatcher? (I couldn’t see it). I actually say make up Julianne Moore for the part. Seriously.
As soon as this writer said Julianne Moore, I could totally see it. I would not be the least bit surprised if she gets the role. Helen Mirren was great as the Queen, but honestly the only reason they brought her name up is that some of the Queen team are doing another movie about a notable British figure. Mirren really isn’t someone I could see in the runnings for this role.
I like that they are focusing on one specific event rather than a life story. The Falklands/Malvinas War was a very significant part of British history, and one that needs to be told. To tell this story from the point of the Prime Minister in power during that trying time would bring a different perspective to the traditional war story.
But do you think this movie would ever even be considered if it was not for the success of The Queen?
Well yes I did live in britain during the 80’s…….as a child, so I dont have any memory of anything political, etc…
Point is, people saw her as a bitch for many wrong reasons, they didnt have the capability of looking at the larger picture.
“most actors just play a variant of their own personality”
And real actors can be anyone they want to be in spite of who they really are. Its just easier to be yourself.
“she sure wasnt the bitch many unforseeing fools make out she was”
Ricci you didnt live in Britain through the 80s did you. She was a bitch, and you can make a case for what she did for the economy if you want but how does that stop her being a bitch.
Rodney.. perhaps, then, I should have said that there’s not an American actress capable of doing the role. There aren’t many British actresses capable of it, either. This isn’t a generic “English voice” you’re trying to replicate…
Oh well, maybe I will be proven wrong… but, most actors just play a variant of their own personality.
Yes Matt, and Australians cant do American accents either. Ask Mel Gibson, Russel Crowe and Nicole Kidman.
That is a very narrow minded thought that it HAS to be a British woman to ACT like a British woman. Actors act. Its what they do.
It doesnt matter who they are off screen. They act.
I have to wonder if anyone that would suggest Julianne Moore for this role has ever seen Margaret Thatcher in action :) JM couldn’t pull it off, if only because she doesn’t have the voice for it. And the voice is almost everything in this case… Helen Mirren can’t do it, either.
American women aren’t raised to pull off characters like Margaret Thatcher. Rational, hard-nosed, etc.. you need a British woman of the type that aren’t made very often any more. You need a woman that can play with men on their terms, rather than a woman that pretends that men aren’t important.
I just watched a sweet film on the weekend, This Is England, which happened to be set in England 1983, written and directed by Shane Meadows (Dead Man’s Shoe’s) and based loosely on his own life experiences. It was an awsome little film, very much like Dead Man’s Shoes, a drama with light bits and very heavy bits.
Thatcher is shown in this movie only in actual footage from 1983, which is used throughout the film with very positive results, very much like the Emilio Estevez film Bobby (which I watched last night, excellent film) and she is not shown in a very good light, but on the other hand, the movie is shot from the perspective from a bunch of Skinheads, which are surprisingly nothing like the skinheads of North America, very likeable bunch.
ANywho, This Is England gets my highest recommendation, especially if you have seen and enjoyed Dead Man’s Shoes, it should appeal to you.
Nord
Hero she may not have been, but she sure wasnt the bitch many unforseeing fools make out she was.
Bringing the nation forward into a new generation, moving away from the industries of old was not a bad thing.
If they make that Woman look like a hero im going to be mightly pissed off.
Maggie Thatcher was a wicked bitch, and this romantic notion of “The Iron Lady” make me sick.
not interested at all in this film. Margaret Thatcher???? I was a school when she was in power and I never had any interest in politics growing up, although I do take not of whats going on these days now I’m a bit older & hopefully wiser. Why can’t they tell the story from Denis Thatcher’s POV instead and make it a comedy as he always came across as a bit clumsy. And didn’t their son get lost on the Paris Dakkar rally or something? have him kidnapped by a rival Argentinian rally team and held to ransom too. Better yet, scrap it and make a biopic of the one of those Italian porn queen prime-ministers who has to juggle her day between running the country into the ground and sucking off rocco siffredi in her next flick!!!
S.
Thatcher couldn’t believe her ‘luck’ when Argentina invaded the Falklands, if it wasn’t for the war she wouldn’t have won the election in ’83.
Should be interesting viewing though.
Maybe it wouldnt have been a large scale project if not for the sucess of the queen, but BBC often make very well made TV features.
I had no interest in seeing the queen, but this one has peaked my interest, I’m english and was born the year before the falklands, yet I know more about anchient wars than what actually happened during this conflict – seeing this from the side of the lady in power would be I think a valuable history lesson.